Rank higher on Google Maps and attract more patients with this complete dental SEO guide.
A dental practice in Houston, TX went from buried on page 3 to ranking in the Google Maps Local Pack in 11 weeks. They didn't change their services, hire new staff, or spend a dollar on ads. They fixed six things on their Google Business Profile and built a consistent review system. That's what dental SEO actually looks like when it works.
If you run a dental practice in the US and you're not showing up when patients nearby search "dentist near me" or "teeth cleaning [your city]", this guide is exactly what you need. I'm going to walk you through every step: optimizing your Google Business Profile, building reviews the right way (staying HIPAA-compliant), fixing your business listings, and getting your website to support your Maps ranking.
📊 Flento Data: Flento's analysis of 2,000+ US business profiles shows that dental practices consistently leave more ranking opportunity on the table than almost any other healthcare business. Most have a GBP. Very few have an optimized one.
If you haven't read our complete local SEO guide yet, skim the overview first, it'll give context to everything that follows.
Other patient-facing practices follow a similar model, including urgent care clinics.
Other local businesses face this exact challenge, such as local SEO for new businesses.
The majority of new dental patients start their search on Google, not on Healthgrades, not on Zocdoc, and not from a billboard. When someone in your area searches "dentist near me" or "emergency dentist [your city]," Google shows three practices in the Local Pack before any other results. If you're not in that top three, you're invisible to most of those searchers.
Here's what that means in numbers: 46% of all Google searches in the US have local intent. For healthcare searches specifically, industry research shows that over 70% of patients use Google to find or evaluate a local provider before booking. And the top three results in the Google Maps Local Pack receive 44% of all clicks.
The dental market in the US is also highly localized by nature. A patient in Scottsdale, AZ isn't driving to a dentist in Phoenix if there are 20 options within five miles. This is good news, you don't need to compete nationally. You need to rank in your neighborhood, your zip code, your city.
The challenge is that most dental practices set up a Google Business Profile once and never touch it again. Their competitors, even ones with fewer patients and less experience, are consistently outranking them because they treat local SEO as an active, ongoing system rather than a one-time task.
💡 Pro Tip: If your dental practice has been open more than a year and you're not showing up in the Local Pack for searches like "dentist [your city]," your GBP is almost certainly the first place to look. We'll get to that in the next section.
A vertical-specific version of this is our guide to local SEO for orthodontists.
Google uses three core factors to rank businesses in local search: proximity, relevance, and prominence. Understanding how each one applies to dental practices helps you focus on what actually moves the needle.
Proximity is how close your practice is to the person searching. You can't control your physical address, but you can control how well your listing signals that you serve specific neighborhoods, zip codes, and service areas. Practices that list their service area correctly and include location-relevant content on their website consistently outperform equally-optimized practices that don't.
Relevance is how well your Google Business Profile and website match what the patient is searching for. A dentist who only lists "Dentist" as their primary category will rank for fewer searches than one who has correctly set "General Dentist" as their primary category and added "Cosmetic Dentist," "Pediatric Dentist," or "Emergency Dental Service" as secondary categories, depending on what they actually offer.
Prominence is the hardest factor to game and the most important to build over time. It includes your review volume, review recency, how often patients engage with your listing, and signals from third-party sites, Healthgrades, Zocdoc, your practice's website, and dental directories like the ADA's Find-a-Dentist.
📊 Flento Data: Dental practices that actively update their GBP at least twice per week (via posts, new photos, or Q&A responses) are 3.1x more likely to appear in the Local Pack than practices that update monthly or less.
Action Step: Before moving on, pull up your current Google Business Profile. Check your primary category (it should be "General Dentist" or the most specific match for your practice type), and note the last date you added a photo or posted an update. That date gap is usually where the ranking problem starts.
For more on managing customer feedback, see HIPAA-compliant review management.
Your Google Business Profile is the single most important asset in your dental SEO strategy. It's what shows up in the Local Pack, in Google Maps, and increasingly in AI-generated search summaries. Getting it right should be the first thing you do, before anything else.
Your primary GBP category directly determines which searches you're eligible to appear in. For dental practices, "General Dentist" is the most common correct choice. If you specialize, use the most specific match: "Cosmetic Dentist," "Orthodontist," "Pediatric Dentist," or "Oral Surgeon" are all distinct categories in Google's system.
⚠️ Common Mistake: Many practices list "Dentist" instead of "General Dentist." These are different categories in Google's system, and "Dentist" is less specific. If your primary category doesn't match the service patients search most often, you're leaving rankings on the table before any other factor comes into play.
Your GBP business description (up to 750 characters) should include your primary service types, your city and state, and at least one or two supporting services (whitening, Invisalign, emergency care, pediatric services, whatever applies to your practice). Don't stuff keywords, but write naturally about what makes your practice the right choice for a patient in your specific area.
A dental practice in Chicago, IL that specializes in family dentistry might include: "Serving Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood since 2009. We offer general, cosmetic, and pediatric dentistry for families. Same-week appointments available." That's 165 characters, specific, location-aware, and written for the patient, not an algorithm.
Google actively demotes listings where the posted hours don't match reality. Make sure your hours are correct, and, this one's easy to miss, update your holiday hours each year. A listing that shows "Open" on a federal holiday when you're actually closed will earn complaints, hurt your star rating, and signal to Google that your listing isn't actively maintained.
Google allows dental practices to add an appointment booking link directly to their GBP. If your practice management software (Dentrix, Eaglesoft, Curve Dental, etc.) integrates with Google's booking partners, activate this. Practices with booking links enabled see noticeably higher conversion rates from profile views to actual appointments.
💡 Pro Tip: Once your GBP is optimized, the fastest next step is making sure your profile is properly configured in Google's category system. Read our guide on how to optimize your Google Business Profile for a complete step-by-step walk through every section.
Photos are one of the most underused ranking signals in dental SEO. Practices with 10+ current photos consistently outperform those with 2–3 old stock images. Upload: interior shots of the waiting room, treatment rooms, and front desk, team photos of the dentist, hygienists, and front staff, before/after photos with patient consent (following HIPAA guidelines carefully here), and exterior shots so patients can find you easily.
Aim to upload at least 2 new photos per month. This signals to Google that your listing is actively managed.
Action Step: Set a recurring monthly reminder to upload fresh photos to your GBP. Consistency beats quantity, 2 photos every month is more valuable than 20 photos uploaded once and then nothing.
A vertical-specific version of this is our guide to local SEO for home health care.
Reviews are the most visible ranking signal in dental SEO, and the one where most practices are leaving the most opportunity behind. Star rating and review count directly influence where you appear in the Local Pack, and review recency matters more than total volume.
This is where dental practices need to be careful. HIPAA prohibits disclosing Protected Health Information (PHI), which includes the fact that someone is a patient at your practice. When requesting reviews, you must never: including the patient's name in your review request, referencing any treatment they received, sending review requests through unsecured email channels that expose PHI, or offering any incentive for a review, which also violates FTC guidelines.
What you can do: Ask patients verbally at checkout to leave a review if they had a good experience. Send a generic follow-up text or email that doesn't reference their appointment specifics, just a friendly note saying you'd appreciate their feedback.
A general dentist in Nashville, TN implemented a simple verbal ask system at their front desk, receptionist cards with a QR code that linked directly to their Google review page. Within 90 days, they went from 27 reviews with a 3.9 average to 61 reviews with a 4.6 average. No PHI involved, full compliance maintained.
This is something most dental practices get backwards. Having 200 reviews is less valuable than having 20 reviews in the last 90 days. Google weights recency heavily because it signals that a business is currently active and currently earning patient trust, not just a business that was popular five years ago.
Our guide on review velocity and how many reviews you need to rank breaks down exactly how many reviews per month you should be targeting based on your market size.
Responding to reviews is a confirmed ranking signal. More importantly for dental practices, it's also a patient trust signal, prospective patients read responses as much as they read the reviews themselves. For positive reviews, a warm, brief acknowledgment is enough. For negative reviews, respond professionally, avoid acknowledging the patient-provider relationship (for HIPAA compliance), and offer to resolve issues offline.
⚠️ HIPAA Reminder: When responding to reviews, even negative ones, never confirm that the reviewer is a patient of your practice. Your response should be framed as if speaking to a general member of the public. Example: "We take all feedback seriously and would welcome the opportunity to address your concerns directly. Please contact our office at (555) 123-4567."
💡 Pro Tip: The moment after a patient checkout is the highest-conversion time to ask for a review. Studies on local review behavior consistently show same-day requests convert 3x better than requests sent 48+ hours later.
Action Step: This week, draft a compliant review request script for your front desk staff to use at checkout. Keep it simple, non-coercive, and HIPAA-safe.
The same local search tactics apply to other verticals, including local seo strategy from scratch.
NAP stands for Name, Address, and Phone number. Every time your dental practice appears online, on Google, Yelp, Healthgrades, Zocdoc, the ADA directory, Facebook, and 40+ other directories, your NAP information needs to be exactly the same.
This matters because Google uses these external listings as trust signals. When your information matches consistently, Google gains confidence that you are who you say you are, in the location you claim. When there are inconsistencies, "Suite 200" vs. "Ste. 200," a toll-free number on some directories and a local number on others, or an old address from a previous location, Google's confidence in your listing drops, and so can your rankings.
Tier 1 (Essential): Google Business Profile, Yelp, Facebook Business Page, Healthgrades, and Zocdoc.
Tier 2 (High-Value Dental/Medical): WebMD Find-a-Doctor, Vitals, US News Health, RateMDs, the ADA's Find-a-Dentist directory for members, and 1-800-Dentist.
Tier 3 (General Business Directories): Bing Places, Apple Maps, Yellow Pages, Foursquare, and Nextdoor, especially valuable for neighborhood-level visibility.
The fastest way to stabilize your dental practice's local rankings is what we call the Flento NAP Lock, a three-step process: (1) decide on your exact canonical NAP (the official version you'll use everywhere), (2) audit your top 20 listings against that canonical, and (3) correct any discrepancy before doing any other optimization. Before you touch your GBP description, add photos, or build new citations, run the NAP Lock first.
📊 Flento Data: Dental practices with fully consistent NAP across their top 25 directories rank, on average, 2.4 positions higher in the Local Pack than practices with 5+ citation discrepancies.
Action Step: Search your practice name on Google. Click through the first 10 results and check your NAP on each one. Write down any discrepancy you find. That's your NAP correction list, start there.
Your website directly supports your Google Maps ranking, even though the two might seem separate. Google uses signals from your website (specifically, how well it matches local search intent) to validate and reinforce your GBP listing.
Every dental practice website needs a minimum local SEO foundation:
Location-specific title tags. Your homepage title should include your city and state: "Family Dentist in Austin, TX | [Practice Name]" not just "[Practice Name] | Dentistry."
A dedicated location page (or pages). If you have one location, your contact page should include your full NAP, an embedded Google Map, your service hours, and a brief paragraph about your neighborhood or city. If you serve multiple locations, each location needs its own page with unique content.
Service pages with local context. Your services, teeth cleaning, Invisalign, dental implants, etc., should each have their own page with your city mentioned naturally in the copy. "Invisalign in [Your City]" is a real search term that converts. A landing page targeting it directly can drive local organic traffic on top of your Maps presence.
Local business schema markup helps Google understand your practice's information in a structured way. For dental practices, use DentalClinic schema (a subtype of MedicalBusiness) with your: practice name, street address, phone number, hours of operation, geographic coordinates, and an optional but useful priceRange field.
This doesn't directly boost rankings in a dramatic way, but it reduces the chance of Google misinterpreting your business type or location, which can quietly suppress rankings without any obvious error.
It sounds almost too simple, but embedding your Google Maps listing directly on your practice's Contact or Location page strengthens the geographic association between your website and your physical address. It takes five minutes and it's a genuine local SEO signal.
💡 Pro Tip: For dental practices with websites on WordPress, Wix, or Squarespace, adding local schema and an embedded map is a one-afternoon task. If your website hasn't been updated in 3+ years, prioritize a content and metadata review before any other tactic in this guide.
Action Step: Open your practice website and check your homepage title tag. If your city and state aren't in it, add them today. That one change can move the needle within 2–3 weeks.
After working with hundreds of healthcare and dental practices across the US, the biggest ranking gains come not from doing one thing perfectly, but from doing all the right things in the right order. That's what the Flento Dental SEO Stack is built around.
The Stack has four layers, and each one builds on the previous:
Layer 1, Foundation (Week 1–2) Run the NAP Lock. Fix every citation discrepancy you find. Correct your GBP primary category. Verify your hours, address, and phone number are exactly right across Google, Yelp, and Facebook.
Layer 2, Profile Completeness (Week 2–3) Fully complete your GBP: business description, all secondary categories, attributes (wheelchair accessible, free parking, accepts insurance, etc.), appointment booking link, and services list. Upload 10+ photos. Answer any existing Q&A questions, and seed 3–5 common patient questions in the Q&A section yourself.
Layer 3, Review System (Week 3–4) Implement your HIPAA-compliant review request system. Train your front desk. Set up a QR code card at checkout that links directly to your Google review page. Aim to generate at least 4–8 new reviews per month consistently.
Layer 4, Active Maintenance (Ongoing) Post a GBP update at least once per week (appointment availability, seasonal promotions, new services, dental tips). Upload 2 new photos per month. Respond to every review within 48 hours. Monitor your local rankings weekly.
The practices that dominate local dental SEO in their market aren't doing anything extraordinary in any single layer. They're executing all four layers consistently. That's the whole game.
For a deeper look at how Google's ranking algorithm weighs each of these signals, the guide on local SEO ranking factors breaks down what actually matters in 2026 versus what used to matter.
AI is now the third channel patients use to find dentists, and most practices have no strategy for it.
Google's AI Overviews appear for roughly 60% of dental search queries in 2026. When someone searches "best dentist for dental implants in Dallas" or "is this dentist accepting new patients near me," they often see an AI-generated summary before any traditional search results. The practices cited in those summaries aren't always the top-ranked organic results, they're the ones with the clearest, most complete structured information.
ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity are now used by patients to research dental services, compare providers, and ask questions like "what's the difference between a general dentist and a periodontist?" These AI tools pull from publicly available content, GBP data, and high-authority directories. Practices that don't show up in this layer are invisible to a growing segment of prospective patients.
How to optimize for AI search as a dental practice:
1. Structure your FAQ content for direct extraction. AI tools pull answers from pages that lead with direct, concise answers. Instead of "Welcome to our dental blog, today we'll discuss wisdom teeth," write "Wisdom tooth removal typically takes 45–60 minutes for a single tooth. Most patients return to normal activities within 3–5 days." The second version is extractable. The first isn't.
2. Add DentalClinic structured data (schema markup). Schema markup tells Google and AI tools exactly what your practice is, where it is, what services you offer, and what patients say about it. DentalClinic schema, combined with Review schema for your Google reviews, is how your practice gets cited in AI Overviews rather than just appearing in traditional results.
3. Keep your GBP services section complete and specific. AI Overviews pull heavily from GBP Services when answering queries like "dentist that does Invisalign near me." Each service entry should include the service name, a 1–2 sentence description, and pricing if you offer it. Practices with incomplete services sections don't appear in these responses.
4. Build authority on specific procedures. AI tools favor sources that have dedicated, detailed content on specific services over practices with a single generic "Services" page. A dedicated page for implants, a dedicated page for Invisalign, a dedicated page for children's dentistry, each one increases your chances of being cited in AI responses for those specific queries.
📊 Flento Data: Dental practices with complete GBP profiles, DentalClinic schema, and procedure-specific content are significantly more likely to appear in Google AI Overview citations for local dental queries than practices with partial profiles and generic service pages.
🔥 Quick Win: Search "dentists near me" or "dentist [your city]" in Google right now. If an AI Overview appears, look at which practices are cited. Those are your direct AI optimization competitors, not just your traditional Local Pack competitors.
Action Step: Add DentalClinic schema to your practice's homepage and each location page. This is a one-time implementation that permanently increases your AI citation potential. If you're not sure how, your web developer or a local SEO tool like Flento can handle it.
Managing all four layers of the Dental SEO Stack manually is doable, but it's time-consuming, and dental practices don't have a dedicated marketing team sitting around. That's where Flento comes in.
Google Business Profile Optimizer, Flento walks you through completing every section of your GBP with field-by-field guidance. It flags incomplete sections, incorrect categories, and missing attributes so you don't have to guess what Google is looking for.
Google Review Management Software, Flento's review management tools let you monitor new reviews, set up automated (and HIPAA-compliant) review request workflows, and respond to reviews from a single dashboard. No more logging in to Google every day to check.
Business Listing Management Software, Flento syncs your NAP information across 50+ directories automatically. Change your hours or address once in Flento, and it pushes to every directory. This is how you run the Flento NAP Lock at scale without manually visiting 30 different websites.
Local Keyword Rank Tracker, Track exactly where your dental practice ranks for searches like "dentist [your city]," "teeth cleaning near me," and "emergency dentist [neighborhood]." See your ranking history over time and measure the impact of every change you make.
Thousands of US businesses, including healthcare and dental practices, use Flento to manage their local SEO in one place. Dental practices typically see measurable ranking movement within 4–8 weeks of completing the foundational setup.
Try Flento free →
✅ Done? Let Flento automate steps 8, 9, 12, and 15–16 → Try Flento free →
Q: How long does dental SEO take to show results? A: Most US dental practices see measurable improvement in Google Maps rankings within 6–12 weeks of completing foundational optimizations (GBP completeness, NAP correction, and initial review velocity). Highly competitive markets like New York, NY, Chicago, IL, or Los Angeles, CA may take 3–6 months to see significant Local Pack movement. Less competitive mid-size markets often move faster.
Q: Do I need a website to rank in Google Maps for dental searches? A: No, a website is not strictly required to appear in the Local Pack. However, practices with an optimized website consistently rank higher than those without one, because Google uses website signals to verify and strengthen your GBP listing. For any dental practice with serious local SEO goals, a website is strongly recommended.
Q: What Google Business Profile categories should a dentist use? A: Your primary category should be the most specific match for your core service: "General Dentist," "Cosmetic Dentist," "Orthodontist," "Pediatric Dentist," or "Oral Surgeon." Secondary categories can include complementary services you offer, a general dentist who also does Invisalign and whitening could add "Cosmetic Dentist" as a secondary. Don't add categories for services you don't offer.
Q: How do US dental practices ask for reviews without violating HIPAA? A: HIPAA compliance in review requests means never referencing the patient-provider relationship or any treatment details. A verbal ask at checkout ("If you had a great experience today, we'd really appreciate a Google review") is fully compliant. Generic follow-up texts or emails that don't reference the appointment are also acceptable. Never send review requests through unencrypted email systems that carry PHI. When in doubt, consult your HIPAA compliance officer before implementing any automated review request system.
Q: Does Google rank dental practices differently than other businesses? A: Google applies the same core ranking framework (proximity, relevance, prominence) to all local businesses, including dental practices. However, healthcare businesses including dentists benefit from appearing in specialized medical directories (Healthgrades, Zocdoc, WebMD), which act as high-authority citations. Google also appears to give weight to the ADA's Find-a-Dentist listing for verified ADA members.
Q: What does NAP consistency mean for a dental practice, and why does it matter? A: NAP stands for Name, Address, and Phone number. Google uses your NAP information across directories as a trust signal, consistent information across all listings (Yelp, Healthgrades, Facebook, your website, and 40+ other directories) tells Google your practice information is accurate and trustworthy. Inconsistencies, like using "(555) 123-4567" on Google but "555.123.4567" on Yelp, or listing "Suite 200" on some directories and "Ste. 200" on others, create confusion and can suppress your local ranking.
Q: Should a dental practice with multiple locations create separate GBP listings? A: Yes. Each physical location should have its own Google Business Profile with the correct address, phone number, and hours for that location. Do not create a single GBP listing and try to cover multiple addresses, Google will likely flag this as a violation of GBP guidelines, and it confuses patients searching for a specific location. Managing multiple location listings is one area where Flento's Business Listing Management Software is particularly useful.
Q: How is local SEO different for a pediatric or children's dentistry practice? A: Children's dentistry local SEO works the same way structurally, but the primary category and search language change. Set your primary GBP category to "Pediatric Dentist" rather than "General Dentist," because parents search "pediatric dentist near me" or "kids dentist [city]" and Google matches on that specific category. Fill your business description and reviews with the language parents actually use (gentle, kid-friendly, first visit), and list on family and pediatric health directories alongside the standard dental citations. A pediatric practice in Columbus, OH that switched its primary category from "Dentist" to "Pediatric Dentist" started appearing for parent-intent searches it had never ranked for.
Q: How do dentists improve SEO on Bing, not just Google? A: Bing SEO for dentists starts with claiming and verifying your listing on Bing Places for Business, which you can import directly from your verified Google Business Profile in one step. Bing uses the same core signals, accurate NAP, categories, reviews, and citations, so a clean citation profile helps you on both engines at once. Bing matters more than its search share suggests because it powers results inside Windows, Microsoft Copilot, and other AI assistants, so a dental practice with a verified, consistent Bing listing is easier for those tools to surface.
Q: Is it worth hiring a dental local SEO company? A: For a single-location practice, the highest-impact work (GBP completeness, review requests, NAP consistency) can be handled in-house without an agency, especially with software that automates the repetitive parts. A dental SEO company earns its cost when you're managing multiple locations, want ongoing content and link building, or genuinely don't have the time to run the fundamentals consistently. Whichever route you choose, evaluate any agency by whether they fix your GBP and citations first, not whether they promise a specific ranking position, no legitimate dental local SEO company can guarantee that.
Every week your Google Business Profile sits incomplete and your reviews go unanswered, a patient who searched for a dentist in your area called your competitor instead. That's not a dramatic statement, it's just how the math works when 44% of local search clicks go to the top three results.
The good news: most of what's covered in this guide can be completed in a focused weekend. Fix the NAP, complete the GBP, implement a review system, update your website title tags. Those four moves alone will put you ahead of the majority of dental practices in your area who haven't done any of it.
For dental practices in competitive markets like Dallas, TX, Atlanta, GA, or San Diego, CA, you'll need to maintain the full Dental SEO Stack on an ongoing basis. But even in a competitive market, consistent execution of fundamentals beats occasional bursts of complex optimization every time.
Try Flento free → and see how quickly your dental practice can start moving up in local search.
